In today's business environment, employees often must resort to many sources of information and means of communication to effectively perform tasks as part of their responsibilities. Increasingly, those tasks require receiving, locating, editing, or creating information using computer programs.
One group of programs helps to create or maintain knowledge or content management. These programs may include software for email, word processing, accounting, presentation, and scheduling, such as Microsoft Outlook, Word, PowerPoint, Excel, Lotus Notes, Lotus Organizer, and Adobe Acrobat. Typically, these programs are based on a user's personal computer or a local server. They often result in “loose” files that are personal to the individual who creates them.
Certain business roles also require accessing or manipulating data stored in large databases, such as enterprise solution software. These enterprise packages provide a single entry point to information, applications, and services that people need to do their jobs according to their role in the organization. They provide a way for suppliers, customers, partners, and employees to access all relevant content easily and securely and to participate in all types of business processes. Since information and applications are unified, users can identify and address business issues faster, more effectively, and at a lower cost. Specific enterprise solutions may exist for assisting the company with enterprise resource planning, customer resource management, human resource management, and supply chain management.
Given the large amount of information that must be handled by these applications, a user is often presented with a report containing a massive amount of information. Often, a user is required to review information that is not relevant to the completion of a task. Having to review this irrelevant information is a waste of an organization's resources. Prior art systems do not allow a user to view the most relevant information needed to complete an operational task and to also have access to the full amount of information available without querying a report. The present invention is directed to overcoming one or more of these deficiencies.